


Friends will always find a way

by traumschwinge



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies), X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe - Children, Alternate Universe - Fusion, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Burglary, Fluff, Gen, Sickly Charles
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-23
Updated: 2014-04-23
Packaged: 2018-01-20 08:44:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,262
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1504109
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/traumschwinge/pseuds/traumschwinge
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for followedbyblackeyes' prompt I got on tumblr:</p>
<p>"I would really appreciate an au where Erik is playing baseball with a few friends (bonus if they're the avengers) around the neighborhood when he hits a home run and the ball crashes through someone’s window, so he goes to apologize and meets a paralyzed or terminally ill Charles confined to his bed. And cue the friendship that turns into more than just a friendship while Erik helps Charles with things he can’t do because of said disability/sickness."</p>
<p>I took the liberty to turn every character into a child so sorry for the lack of "more than friendship".</p>
            </blockquote>





	Friends will always find a way

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Rithmae](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rithmae/gifts).



> OOOOOOOOOOOOPS.
> 
> I think my hand slipped. 
> 
> A glorious tale of Erik and the Avengers breaking windows and making friends with a poor sickly child, I might have overdone it a bit. Ooops again.
> 
> I imagine all the characters in the fic (save for the parents) to be around eleven, twelve years old. Sorry for the lack in the “more than just friendship” department but this idea went away with me.
> 
> My dear [Yamipanther](yamipanther.tumblr.com) kindly drew [an illustration](http://yamipanther.tumblr.com/post/83420864067/quick-dirty-illustration-for-cherik-au-by) for this fic. ~~Am I supposed to call her talented?~~

When Erik closed his eyes that night, he could still hear the shatter of glass and the shocked looks on Bruce’s and Steve’s faces when all three of them had realized what they’d just done. It had been an accident, he told himself. But he still felt bad that he had run, instead of ring the doorbell of the house that’s window he’d broken and apologize. That would have been the right thing to do. But it was one of the big brick houses along the park and everyone knew that the people living there weren’t very friendly. He had been afraid. He had run from there just like his friends.

And now he couldn’t sleep because he felt guilty.

After all, it had been him who had hit the ball that flew through the window.

Next day after school, Erik felt so bad he was sure he wouldn’t sleep ever again if he didn’t go to that house and apologize. His mother wouldn’t be happy about the broken window. But he hoped she would at least not be too mad. At least, he had decided to apologize for it on his own.

He went straight to the house, but just as he was about to ring the door bell, he couldn’t do it. He was too nervous. Wiping his sweaty hands on his jeans, he went over to the window he’d broken. It had been temporarily fixed with foil. He wondered how long it would talk to replace the glass and how expensive it would be. Sure he wouldn’t be able to pay for it with his pocket money. Erik swallowed.

Just when he was retreating—maybe he could come back later with his friends as backup or just tell his mother and let her handle things and yell at him for being stupid—someone called out to him. “So the culprit returns to the scene of crime.”

Erik stopped dead in his tracks. Shit!

There was some laughter followed by a worrying amount of coughing. Erik turned around slowly. There was a boy leaning onto the windowsill right behind him. He was about Erik’s age, but he’d never seen him at school or around town before. Erik was sure he would remember him. Brown hair, pale skin, red lips, weak body—that boy was practically asking to be teased. “So it really was you who broke the library window?” the boy laughed. His eyes twinkled when he talked, before they went unfocused and he coughed again.

Erik knew it was a stupid idea but he went over to the boy. It would be easier to talk if he was closer. If he was sick, Erik wouldn’t want him to overdo himself just because of Erik. “I came to say I’m sorry,” he told the boy, pushing his chin forward. He would not let him treat like he had done something wrong.

The boy smiled. “Really?” He coughed again. “Can I tell you a secret?” He leaned closer to Erik, forward and down until he was so far outside Erik started getting afraid he might fall. Erik pressed his lips together and nodded. “I liked it,” the boy whispered. “Nothing ever happens here. It was…nice.”

Erik blinked at the boy, surprised and confused. “You do?”

The boy beamed and nodded. Another coughing fit followed.

“Hey, are you sick?” Erik asked.”Should I call for help?” He helped the boy lean back again, get him securely back inside.

“Just a cold, really,” the boy told him.

Erik snorted. “It doesn’t sound like one.”

“But it is,” the boy insisted. “I just have a weak constitution!”

“A what?”

“I get sick easily,” the boy sighed.

“Oh,” Erik said because he didn’t really know what to say. “Wanna play sometime when you’re better?”

The boy shook his head. He looked very sad all of a sudden. “My mother doesn’t want me to go outside. Because I get sick so easily.”

“But you’d want to?” Erik asked. The boy had sounded like it.

The boy nodded, looking down at the lawn.

Erik grinned. “How about a deal,” he drawled. “You don’t tell your parents that I broke that window. And I will be back tomorrow and we can play here. Like this. With you inside and me here.”

“This won’t work,” the boy answered. He did sound hopeful, though.

“I want to try anyway, don’t you?” Erik said. “What’s you name, anyway?”

“I’m Charles,” the boy smiled.

“I’m Erik,” Erik answered. “See you tomorrow, Charles.” Waving, Erik left the garden.

The next day, Erik came back with a baseball. They played catch with the ball for a while. But Charles got exhausted so easily. So Erik sat down in the grass and Charles sat down on a chair at the window and they talked until it would get dark.

The day after that, Erik brought a book and they read excerpts from the books they were just reading on their own to each other. Soon, they build up a routine, one day, Erik would bring a ball and they would play catch for a while before talking and the next they would spend reading and talking until it was time for Erik to go home.

The next few weeks passed just like that. Erik would spent all his afternoons with Charles. Charles was determined to teach him chess and to his surprise, Erik liked it. So now it was playing ball and chess in turns and only talking about books while they played.

Erik’s friends started to ask him where he was going, why he didn’t come to play anymore. He told them about Charles. In fact, Charles was about the only thing he talked about those days, even with his mother, even though he was careful not to mention how they’d met. He would talk about books and chess as well, but that was talking about Charles as well, really.

One afternoon, he had to give in to his friends. He had no choice, really, as they had taken on to following him to Charles’ house as if they didn’t know which one it was. He pretended he didn’t notice Bruce through the window of a car he was hiding behind or Thor around a corner he walked around too quickly. If they wanted to follow him, he wouldn’t complain.

What he didn’t like was to find Natasha and Clint already waiting for him, together with Tony and Charles, who were already talking animatedly about something that sounded suspiciously geeky and a lot like science. Erik dropped his bag on the lawn in surprise. He had to close his eyes and count to ten so he wouldn’t get angry at his friends. Charles was his friend, what where his other friends doing here.

“What are you doing here?” he hissed at his friends. He resisted the urge to step in between Charles and Tony and tell them all to get lost.

“We wanted to see who you think is more interesting than us,” Natasha smirked.

“Yeah, how could you hide someone so cool hide from us?” Tony chimed in, interrupting Charles babbling about the spider living in his room. “Wanted to keep him all to yourself, eh.”

Erik blushed. He just hoped that it would come off as anger and Tony wouldn’t notice that he’d hit bull’s eye. The grin on Tony’s face crushed all his hopes a second later. Charles’ smile, however, was worth all the teasing he would have to endure.”Erik,” Charles laughed. “Thank you for bringing your friends over.” All his anger at his friends melted in that laugh.

Erik really had no other choice but to let his friends stay.

So his friends joined him and Charles some afternoons, usually on Fridays. There wouldn’t always be all of them like on that first day. But mostly there were. They all liked Charles just as well as Erik liked him. If he’d been just another kid at school, he would be part of their group by now. Especially Tony had formed some bond with Charles over their common interests. Whenever they started talking about science, all Erik could do was sit next to Tony and very pointedly not sulk.

But there were still just enough days when it was just the two of them. Some days, it was planned, because Charles and Erik still enjoyed playing chess together and you couldn’t play chess if there were more than two of them. Some days, though it would be because Charles looked pale and coughed a lot and said that he would get tired too quickly so the others left. Erik never left. On those days, he would sit under the window and read to Charles.

However, things couldn’t go on like that forever. One day, when it was raining too much for Erik to even think about spending his whole afternoon outside if it weren’t for Charles, he took all his courage and rang the doorbell. He just wanted to ask if he could come inside and see Charles like that. Nobody opened the door for him, no matter how many times he ran. When he walked around the house to Charles’ bedroom window, the curtains there were drawn and he didn’t react to him knocking at the glass.

The same happened to him the following two days.

On the forth day, the door was opened after he had rang for the tenth time or so. “What do you want?!” a blond woman snapped at him. “Get lost right now or I’ll call the police!” From the look of her, she could easily be Charles’ mother.

“I want to see Charles,” Erik insisted before he remembered his manners and added, “Please!”

“Charles is sick,” the woman said icily. “And it’s your fault for overexciting him. Come here one more time and I will see to it that you get the punishment you deserve. Get lost!”

Before he could say anything, the woman slammed the door shut. Erik had no choice but to leave. If only he didn’t feel like he was betraying his best friend. But what to do. He had promised his mother not to get into trouble and that woman had said she’d call the police if he came back.

Erik somehow managed through the next day of school without telling anyone what had happened. But on their way home Tony—of course it was Tony—asked, “Hey, aren’t you going to see Charles today?”

And Erik was so angry. At Charles for being sick, at Charles’ mother for not letting him see Charles, at himself even though he didn’t know why he was. He was so angry that when Tony asked him the only response he had was to punch Tony in the face. He didn’t even think about it. He just acted.

It was a good thing they weren’t alone. Had they been, Erik wouldn’t have been back under control—the control of Steve and Bruce, not his own—this fast and he didn’t want to hurt his friends, not really, not even Tony no matter how angry he was.

“Erik, what’s wrong?” Steve asked, calm and collected. Erik stopped struggling against their grips. Tony was still staring at him, eyes wide. Erik had never punched one of his friends before. Other kids, sure, but never one of his friends. Erik felt even worse than he had before.

When he opened his mouth to say he was sorry for punching Tony, the whole story spilled out with the apology. The rest of their way home—they had decided to go to Tony’s because he had a huge tree house of his own, the best place to plot—Erik talked non-stop about what had happened. What Charles’ mother had said. That he felt guilty and angry and sad because he wouldn’t be able to see Charles anymore. He had never talked that much in one day before, maybe not even in a week, if you didn’t count any of the afternoons spent with Charles.

“Well, that’s something,” Steve mused when Erik was done talking. Erik pressed his lips together. He had embarrassed himself enough for one day he thinks. “What are you going to do now?”

Erik shrugged. “There’s nothing we can, can we?”

“Are you giving up on Charles, just like that?” Steve asked.

“There’s nothing I can do!” Erik yelled back at him. He didn’t feel angry anymore but he was desperate enough to still be yelling. He didn’t want to loose Charles.

“But we can,” Clint interjected. “She can’t send all of us away,”

Erik shook his head. “She will, you haven’t seen her. Even if each of us went there on our own for the next days she would never let any of us in.”

“She might just let me in,” Tony murmured, lost in his thoughts.

Erik wiped around to stare at him. “What?!”

“I knew I knew that house,” Tony went on. “I’ve been there. Some years ago, when I was little. I think, my dad is friends with Charles’ mother.”

“What?” Erik leaped to his feet. If Tony was talking shit, he wouldn’t mind punching him for a second time in one day.

“What if we break in and to see Charles?” Natasha asked.

“Break in?” Bruce asked. He looked doubtful.

“How?” Clint grinned.

“We really shouldn’t,” Erik said, but he was grinning as well.

“That’s a bad idea,” Steve said. “Don’t even think about it.”

“Sharon won’t be home this Saturday night,” Tony murmured, still lost in his own mind.

“How do you know?” Clint asked and he and Natasha shifted closer to Tony. Erik can practically see them planing already. Oh god, he was going to break into a house.

“There’s a party my dad’s throwing and she’ll be one of the guests,” Tony mused.

Their eyes sparkling, Clint and Natasha turned to Erik. He couldn’t help but groan. They were so going to do it. “Okay,” Erik asked. “What are we going to do?”

They spent the rest of the afternoon planing. It was mostly Clint and Natasha who seemed the most eager to follow through with the plan and Erik who tried to talk them down at least a little bit. As soon as he realized he couldn’t talk them out of this plan, Steve joined the planning to keep them out of trouble as well as he could. He refused to participate in the actual breaking in, though.

Once in a while, Tony would comment on their plans and fill them in on one detail or another, while he was making his own plans. Erik wished he knew what the hell he was doing that was more important than seeing if Charles was alright and not too lonely but he let him be. There was still a vague guilt lingering on the back of his mind that kept him from snapping at Tony.

The plan was that Steve and Bruce would keep a look on the street. They would be using their phones to stay in touch all the time. Thor would knock on Charles’ window, to see if he was there or at least to see if they’d get any reaction at all. If there wouldn’t be any, Clint would climb a tree in the back garden of the house to a window in the first floor. Windows like that were rarely locked. If Clint could get inside that way, he would rush down to the back door and unlock it for Erik to sneak in. Natasha would be their backup and Thor would cause a ruckus if anything happened so they could run in the ensuing chaos.

They met around the corner from Charles’ house Saturday evening. As soon as Tony messaged them about Sharon Xavier’s arrival at the Stark residence, they split up to carry out the plan. Erik and Natasha sneaked in the garden, hiding in some bushes from where they could see the window of Charles’ room and the back door at the same time. Clint followed short after them, climbing the tree and hiding up there. Erik knew, Steve would be watching the street in front of the house now, from behind a car and Bruce would be watching the garages. When they watched Thor approaching the window, plastic hammer in hand, they knew there was no way back from their plan.

Thor knocked at the window three times, then he waited for a while, before he knocked again. He repeated this one more time and when everything stayed silent after that, he signaled Clint to go. Erik watched his friend balancing to the window along a branch. He fumbled with the window for a moment, before he actually managed to slide it open. The wait that followed was almost too much for Erik’s nerves. They’d estimated Clint would need about five to ten minutes to get to the back door, but every single one of them felt like an eternity to Erik and when the door was still shut after nine minutes, he was ready to climb that tree and go after Clint.

Erik had never felt more relieved in his life as when the door opened and Clint poked his head outside, excitedly waving his hands at them. Erik and Natasha exchanged one quick look before they run over to Clint. “Why did you take so long?” Natasha hissed, once they were inside and the door was closed behind them. Clint grinned and pointed behind them.

“I ran into somebody,” Clint smirked.

“Good evening,” Charles croaked. Erik turned just when Charles padded over, swaying a little. Erik took his arm the second Charles was close enough to reach out for him. Charles was warm and his red cheeks stood out prominently against his much too pale skin. He was hot, his skin too hot and dry against Erik’s.

“You should be in bed,” was all Erik could say. He was so glad to see Charles, but he most definitely wouldn’t cry in front of anyone. “You’re sick.”

Charles smiled. He swayed a little more and was only too ready to let himself collapse against Erik. “I couldn’t stay in bed when you were coming to see me,” he whispered. “I thought I would never see any if you again. Do you have any idea how glad I was when I saw Clint sneaking past my bedroom? I had to come.” Whatever qualms Erik had against crying, Charles hadn’t. By the time he was done talking, he was sobbing into Erik’s shoulder.

“I,” Erik started and then swallowed. “I will always come to see you whenever I can,” he whispered, hoping Clint and Natasha wouldn’t hear him. Charles did, though, and nodded. “But you really should be in bed,” Erik pulled away a little. Charles let him, the first few inches at least. “You’re practically burning.”

Charles nodded. “I don’t feel too well either,” he murmured. “You sure you’re not a dream?”

Erik grinned, looking back over his shoulder at Natasha and Clint. “Very.”

Between the three of them, they managed to get Charles back into bed. Erik never left his side. He knew they wouldn’t have much time and he hated it. He didn’t want to leave Charles alone again. Charles had thought they would just leave him alone again. He never wanted his friend to believe it ever again.

“Charles?” Erik asked when they had Charles settled in his hoard of cushions. Tired blue eyes blinked at him. “We will have to leave soon,” he said softly. “But I promise we’ll be back soon. I promise. Friends forever, understood? We won’t give up on you just now.”

“Yeah, friends forever,” Clint echoed and Natasha chimed in as well after a short moment.

Erik was just about to say something even more embarrassing, when their phone buzzed. Clint and Natasha looked down at their screens and cursed lowly. “We have to go,” Natasha said.

Erik swallowed. He really, really didn’t want to. But he still remembered the last time he’d met Sharon Xavier and he was sure this time, she would call the police without warning. Clint and Natasha were already out the door when Erik turned back to Charles one last time.

“I will be back as soon as I can,” he whispered.

“I know,” Charles smiled. He looked tired. “We’re friends after all.”

“Right,” Erik murmured. Before he could think better of it, he pressed a kiss to Charles’ forehead before he hurried back out of the house. His heart wouldn’t stop pounding until long after he was back at home in his own bed but he blamed it on the excitement.

–

When Erik woke up the next morning, he had a fever. His mother insisted that he would stay in bed and sent his friends away when Steve and Tony came to look for him with some big news. Erik was sick for the rest of the week, whatever he’d caught enough for his mother not to let him go to school.

On Friday, Tony managed to talk Erik’s mother into letting him see Erik to talk about their homework. So Tony sauntered into Erik’s bed room, smug smile on his features and a stack of homework in his hands that he dropped onto Erik’s desk. “I got some great news,” Tony said, sitting down on Erik’s bed. “Wanna hear?”

“What news?” Erik growled. He hated being sick and if his mood had been bad to days ago, it was right now abysmal.

“Oh if you ask me like that, I don’t want to tell you anymore,” Tony teased. “I still owe you for that punch.” He grinned. “Just make sure you’re back at school on Monday, okay? You won’t regret it.”

“Tony, what are you talking about?” Erik grumbled.

“Ah, sorry, gotta go,” Tony got back up again. “Try and do you homework. See you Monday.”

And with that he was out as fast as he’d come.

Erik rolled his eyes. Whatever this had been about, he was trying to get some more sleep. He was curious enough to want to be able to get back to school on Monday.

–

Erik was just barely on time for school on Monday. Getting his mother’s okay to go to school had been surprisingly hard. Erik didn’t really feel sick anymore, but he still looked pale and his temperature was slightly higher than it should be but that was it. Not for his dear life he would miss school when Tony had gone out of his way like that to insure he’d come.

When he entered the class room, he saw that his friends had gathered around one of the few empty desks, the one right next to Erik’s. Only, it didn’t seem to be empty anymore. Erik had a feeling who me might find sitting there, in the middle of his laughing friends but he needed to see it for himself. He hurried a little, just enough so no one would notice.

“Good morning, Erik,” Charles greeted him with the brightest smile Erik had ever seen when he reached his desk.

“Charles,” Erik replied, dumbfounded. He had hoped for this but he hadn’t dared to even imagine it. “What are you doing here?”

“He’ll be going to school with us, that’s what he’s doing,” Tony smirked. “While you guys were busy playing burglars, I talked to my dad. And my dad talked to Charles’ mom. Then I talked to Charles’ mom as well, told her what this school is like. I mean, I lied, of course, made it a little less boring and forgot about some scratched knees and stuff. But you get the idea.”

Erik did, even though he wasn’t really listening. He was much too busy smiling back at Charles. “You really are the new kid in our class?”

“Looks like I am,” Charles laughed. He brushed his bangs out of his eyes. “I still can’t believe I go to school like everyone else.”

Erik was just about to open his mouth to reply to that, when their teacher entered and everyone hurried to their desks. Erik thanked the havens that the desk next to his had been empty and Charles could sit next to him. He wouldn’t let anyone treat him like they usually treated the new kids. If anyone even looked at Charles the wrong way he would make sure they would never do that again. He had the feeling his friends would have his back for that.

Class started and Erik couldn’t help to turn his head to Charles every once in a while and smile at Charles who always responded with the same radiating smile of his own. Halfway through the lesson, Erik couldn’t wait any longer. He needed to get this off his chest. This might just be the happiest day of his life and he felt like he would explode if he didn’t find a vent for it.

He reached out for Charles who only took a heartbeat to meet him at halfway. In his hand, Erik held a note he passed to Charles, but not without squeezing his hand first. He had to assured himself this was real.

  
  


“BEST friends forever. I’m so glad that we’ll now see each other every day at school.”

  
  


Charles’ face lit up the moment he read the note, his smile and eyes growing brighter still, if that was even possible. When the teacher turned away to write something down at the blackboard, Charles turned to Erik and mouthed, “Me too.”


End file.
